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Design Study - the Xanthous Zealot from Heartsong #1

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I just drilled into each of the four classes of Ways and Means, looking at each ability and trying to understand how they combine into the gestalt of a class in Heart, in an attempt to grapple with what is going on in Heart design and what makes that design work for me, or not work for me. As one last design exercise / attempt at fairness / victory lap, I'm taking the boring machine and drilling into the design of the Xanthous Zealot, the class I wrote in Heartsong #1 !
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Design Study - The Witness from Ways and Means

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The fourth and final part of my design deep dive into the classes of Ways and Means! This entry concerns the Witness, a bard-alike who just loves to see all the other player characters accomplish their dreams. The goal for this project is to try to isolate the mechanical design from the thematic elements and analyze how the two inform each other, to see what works for me and what doesn't.
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Design Study - The Snail Pilgrim from Ways and Means

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Part three of four in my deep dive into the class design in Ways and Means! Today's blog is on the Snail Pilgrim, a holy wanderer with the weight of a world on their back. The goal is to talk mostly about the mechanical design, with some reference to the thematic elements and how the two inform each other, to see what works for me and what doesn't.
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Design Study - The Crawler from Ways and Means

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Part two of four in my project to break down the design of the classes in Ways and Means! Today's is the Crawler, the ultimate dungeon delver as shaped by the Heart. The goal is to see if I can isolate the mechanical design from the thematic elements and analyze how the two inform each other, to see what works for me and what doesn't.
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Design Study - The Blightborn from Ways and Means

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As I threatened in my big post on Ways and Means, I will be going through each of the four classes and talking about, line by line, what works for me and what doesn't. It's my hope to be fairly generous, but I don't make any claims towards objectivity. I'll be going through the list in order - first up is the Blightborn.
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Archive Delving - Ways and Means

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I'm back for another archive delve! I'm not digging too deeply through my pile - I'm reading Ways and Means , the (fairly) recent supplement for Heart: The City Beneath ! I took a quick glance through a few weeks ago, but I haven't had a chance to really sit down and grapple with anything yet. I'm excited to read!
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Archive Delving - TUMULUS #6

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A whole half of the year has passed! TUMULUS comes out quarterly - there are two new ones on my to-read pile! I imagine you can see where this is going. Today, I'm delving into TUMULUS 6, the spring 2026 issue, titled Hammer a nail in the coffin .
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